My (earnest, irate) thoughts

In the name of God, most compassionate, most merciful.

It’s a quarter to 5, and even though I’ve only been asleep for five hours and even though it’s still dark outside, I know I must eat three eggs, three slices of bread, a large bowl of Raisin Bran with yogurt, and an overripe pear, and then drink two 16-ounce glasses of water, and 8 ounces of black tea.

Now it still looks black outside, but there is a faint light on the horizon. At about 6, my stomach sloshing with liquid, I will wash my face, head, arms and feet, and perform the dawn prayer. I will ask God to please accept today’s fast. I’ve read that for some, daytime fasting is merely hunger, night prayer merely wakefulness… they remain unchanged by these experiences, or do them for the wrong reasons, and it is not accepted by God. I don’t want that to be me. I don’t want to feel this discomfort for nothing. I want God to change my heart and make me good enough — make me kind, compassionate, thoughtful, tolerant so my heart is wide like the ocean. I beg God to have mercy on me, to give me just that square foot, to accept my fast that is broken sometimes by bad words, my prayers that are full of mistakes, my heart that is weak.

I have enough time to sleep for two more hours. I burrow under the covers, marveling at how lovely it is to return to my soft comforter, my warm sheets. The weak light of dawn streams in the windows. It reminds me of when I was a kid, and I used to set my alarm two hours before I actually had to get up. I would hit the snooze button every twenty minutes, feeling a blurry happiness that I didn’t have to get up yet. But a minute later, my alarm is beeping, and I feel a surge of anger that two hours have already passed.

My mouth is bone-dry. I have a slight headache. My face is puffy and creased with sleep lines. I look truly ugly. That moment is when I feel and look the worst that I will all day. God willing. What’s strange is a few hours from now, my mind will be cleared, my face will be flushed and my eyes will be bright. People look lovely when they fast. It’s something I didn’t know.

Mid-morning and lunchtime hunger pangs pass after an hour or so. Thirst will ebb and flow like the tide. I try not to notice the crunching sounds of other people eating, the slurping sounds of other people drinking. I remind myself that I will appreciate food and drink more, because I know what it is to hunger and thirst. By late afternoon, the acid in my stomach may rumble a bit, making me long for yogurt or milk to calm it. I continue to throw myself into my work or my writing. I pass the time. I’ll come home from work, and consider the foods to break our fast. Often fish, usually rice, vegetables like broccoli or spinach. Fasting makes one long for real food, foods with vitamins and minerals. And water, only water.

But by dinnertime, which comes when the sun disappears over the horizon, I’ll be almost past the point of caring about food and drink. It’s half-past 7, and I’ve gotten used to my dry mouth, my empty stomach. I am calm. I almost don’t care that sunset has come. Almost.

I thank God briefly for the food — so briefly! —and that first sip of water is so cold, so welcome, so much better than the sweetest fruit juice. And this is the image that comes into my head: African children with sad eyes and protruding ribs. And I think of how they don’t know when their next drink is coming, that sunset doesn’t mean their fast is broken, and I am ashamed at my difficulties with thirst, I am embarrassed by my weakness in hunger, and I am stunned by the selfishness of our society. I am disheartened that we could make our world so unequal, that we can let even one day pass without us remembering it, guiltily.

What’s crazy is that people actually blame God for our world’s inequality. Though people clearly have free will, and clearly are not forced to obey any moral code whatsoever, the fact that most of the world goes to bed hungry is, of course, God’s fault.

The other day I was listening to the radio. One of the hosts was talking about how absurd it is that a state senator is suing God. They were discussing, along with callers, what things a person might want to sue God for. Natural disasters and world hunger topped the list. I pondered it for awhile. Then I read a post at jperdue.blogspot.com called God and the tsunami. And I realized that it’s a really good question — why does an all-powerful, all-merciful, all-knowing God allow suffering? If a leaf needs God’s permission to fall from a tree, how can already impoverished cities be toppled by earthquakes, leveled by hurricanes, and flooded by tsunamis? How can God let people go to sleep hungry?

I thought about it for awhile. Then I left a comment, which I will reproduce part of here.

“For believers, suffering is a test of our submission to the will of God. All hardships are an opportunity to gain rewards in heaven for our patience in matters beyond our control. Believers can rest easy knowing that not even a leaf can fall from a tree without God’s permission, and that we will never be tested beyond what we can endure.

For unbelievers, suffering has a two-fold purpose. It is both chastisement and mercy — a mercy because some will heed the wake-up call and be spared a far greater punishment. (Earth itself serves as proof of the existence of heaven and hell, because life on earth can lean either way.) It is only our extremely limited knowledge and understanding that makes events appear random and without purpose.”

We congratulate ourselves for the babies we bear, the money we earn, the food we eat. And yet we, who barely acknowledge God’s existence through the course of a given day — despite the abundant proof of God’s existence in the crazy, hilarious beauty of puppies and babies and flowers — readily acknowledge God’s “fault” in the inequalities of a world in which people choose 100 percent of our own words and actions.

Ramadan has made me, a sinner, incredibly aware of my own weaknesses, like being enslaved to my body and all its incessant wants and needs, but the holy month has also made me grateful for my own power, the power God grants each one of us, to speak good and to do good.

So Yusuf and I are sponsoring children through www.muslimhands.org, a British charity that reaches out to orphans and students of every religion in the poorest countries in the world (mostly Africa and south Asia). We are sponsoring Akbar, a 6-year-old from Bangladesh; Khadijatou, a 10-year-old from Gambia; and Amine, a 13-year-old from Senegal. I keep pictures of the two girls on my desk at work. When I’m hungry, I look at them. I can’t fathom how such a tiny amount of money every month could make a difference in their lives. I am not sure that it does. But I tell myself it is important to try. It’s like that commercial… (”For the price of a cup of coffee per day…”) For me it is such a small sacrifice, it’s not a sacrifice. I don’t even notice the absence of this money. So how could we not even try, especially after we have seen even a short glimpse of their lot in life?